The Bankrupt Hope of the Godless Text: Job 27:7-10
Introduction: The Inescapable Verdict
We come now to a portion of Job's discourse where he takes up his parable and speaks with a kind of settled, resolute finality. His friends have been hammering him with their tidy, Deuteronomic universe where every ache is the direct result of a specific sin, and every bankruptcy notice is a summons from the divine court for some hidden transgression. They are not entirely wrong, of course; the universe is a moral construct because God is a moral being. As a man sows, so shall he reap. This is the grain of the cosmos. But their application of this truth was a bludgeon, and their diagnosis was wooden, simplistic, and cruel. They were trying to solve a mystery with a pocket calculator.
But here, Job, in the midst of his own profound suffering and confusion, does not abandon the foundational truth that God is just and that the wicked will, in the end, receive their due. He is not arguing with God's justice; he is arguing with their application of it to his own case. He maintains his integrity, not by denying God's moral government, but by affirming it so robustly that he can even pronounce a curse upon his own enemies. He is, in effect, saying, "You think I am wicked? Let me show you what I believe about the wicked. Let me show you how much I agree with God about their ultimate end. I will not have my name written on their rolls."
This passage is a cold, hard look at the spiritual balance sheet of the ungodly man. In our therapeutic age, we are told not to be so judgmental. We are encouraged to see the good in everyone, to speak of "brokenness" instead of wickedness, and to imagine that all paths, however crooked, eventually lead to some fluffy, affirming destination. But the Bible is a book of sharp antitheses. There is light and darkness, the just and the unjust, the sheep and the goats, the wise and the foolish. And here, Job lays out the absolute, spiritual insolvency of the man who builds his life on any foundation other than the fear of the Almighty. He shows us that the hope of the godless is a bubble, shimmering for a moment, but destined to pop, leaving behind nothing but a wet spot of despair.
The Text
"May my enemy be as the wicked
And the one who rises against me as the unjust.
For what is the hope of the godless when he is cut off,
When God requires his soul?
Will God hear his cry
When distress comes upon him?
Will he take delight in the Almighty?
Will he call on God at all times?"
(Job 27:7-10 LSB)
The Righteous Curse (v. 7)
Job begins with what sounds like a startling imprecation, a curse.
"May my enemy be as the wicked And the one who rises against me as the unjust." (Job 27:7)
In our sentimental culture, this sounds harsh, uncharitable. We are supposed to wish everyone well, are we not? But this is not a fit of personal pique. This is a judicial statement. Job is aligning himself with God's verdict on wickedness. He is saying that the worst possible fate he can imagine for anyone is for them to be numbered among the wicked and the unjust. This is not about wishing someone a flat tire. It is about wishing that they receive the full weight of what their rebellion against God deserves. It is another way of saying, "Let God be true, and every man a liar."
By saying this, Job is drawing a sharp line in the sand. His friends have been trying to blur that line, suggesting that Job himself has secretly crossed over to the side of the wicked. Job's response is to grab the divine marker and draw the line even darker and thicker. He is saying, "I know what the wicked are, and I know what God thinks of them, and I want no part of it. May my accusers, my enemies, be the ones who are found in that category, for I am not."
This is the essence of what the theologians call an imprecatory prayer. It is not personal vengeance. It is a desire for God's justice to be publicly vindicated. It is a prayer that God would do what He has promised to do: to judge the world in righteousness. When we pray "Your kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven," we are praying for the establishment of justice, which necessarily means the overthrow of injustice. Job is simply being explicit about it. He understands that for God's name to be hallowed, the wicked must be dealt with according to their wickedness.
The Terminal Hope (v. 8)
Next, Job asks a devastatingly logical question about the ultimate prospects of the godless man.
"For what is the hope of the godless when he is cut off, When God requires his soul?" (Job 27:8 LSB)
The word for "godless" here is the Hebrew haneph, which means profane, polluted, or hypocritical. This is the man who lives his life without reference to God. He may be outwardly religious, he may be a pillar of the community, he may have a robust 401(k), but his entire operating system is godless. His hope is invested in this world: his health, his wealth, his reputation, his power. These are the stocks in his portfolio.
But Job points to two events that bankrupt this entire portfolio. The first is being "cut off." This can refer to being cut off from his prosperity, his business dealings, his social standing. The wicked man often builds a formidable empire of stuff. But God can unravel it in an afternoon. A bad diagnosis, a market crash, a political upheaval, and the whole house of cards comes down. When his hope is in his stuff, and the stuff is gone, what is left? Nothing.
The second event is even more final: "When God requires his soul." This is the language of a divine summons. It is the moment of death, the ultimate margin call. God, who gave the soul, now demands it back for inspection. The Lord Jesus uses this very concept in the parable of the rich fool, who built bigger barns for his stuff, only to hear God say, "You fool! This very night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?" (Luke 12:20). At that moment, the hope of the godless is revealed for what it always was: a sham, a counterfeit, a fraudulent claim on a future he did not own.
The hope of the Christian, by contrast, is not in what he possesses, but in who possesses him. Our hope is Christ, which is why death is not a loss, but a gain. For the godless man, death is the great foreclosure. For the Christian, death is the great homecoming.
The Unanswered Cry (v. 9)
Job continues his cross-examination of the godless man's spiritual condition, turning now to his prayer life, or lack thereof.
"Will God hear his cry When distress comes upon him?" (Job 27:9 LSB)
This is a rhetorical question, and the implied answer is a thunderous "No." The book of Proverbs states this principle repeatedly: "Because I have called and you refused, I have stretched out my hand and no one regarded... then they will call on me, but I will not answer; They will seek me diligently, but they will not find me" (Proverbs 1:24, 28). This is not to say that God is incapable of hearing. The issue is judicial, not auditory. God refuses to hear the cry of the man who has refused to hear His call for a lifetime.
The picture is this: a man spends his entire life ignoring God, living as a practical atheist, treating God's commands as irrelevant background noise. His phone rings with God's call, and he sends it to voicemail every single time. But then, distress comes. The pink slip arrives, the biopsy comes back, the sirens are wailing in his driveway. Suddenly, he picks up the phone and tries to make a frantic 911 call to a God he has never known. He cries out, not in repentance, but in panic. It is the cry of a cornered animal, not a returning son.
God is not a cosmic vending machine or a celestial emergency service to be used only when all other options have failed. He is a Father to be known, a King to be obeyed, a God to be worshipped. A relationship with Him is a covenant, not a consumer transaction. The man who treats God as a last resort discovers, to his horror, that the resort is closed.
The Counterfeit Delight (v. 10)
Finally, Job exposes the root problem. The godless man's prayer is not heard because his heart is not right. His religion is one of convenience, not covenant.
"Will he take delight in the Almighty? Will he call on God at all times?" (Job 27:10 LSB)
Here are the two diagnostic questions for true faith. First, "Will he take delight in the Almighty?" The chief end of man is to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever. True faith is not a grim duty; it is a deep delight. The psalmist says, "Delight yourself in the LORD, and He will give you the desires of your heart" (Psalm 37:4). The righteous man finds his greatest pleasure in God Himself. His character, His law, His presence, His works, these are the source of his joy.
The godless man finds no delight in God. He may find delight in religious activities if they bring him social standing. He may find delight in the idea of a God who serves his agenda. But in the Almighty, Shaddai, the all-sufficient, sovereign God? No. That God is a threat to his autonomy. He is a cosmic killjoy. The thought of God is an inconvenience at best, and a terror at worst. He does not want God; he wants a manageable deity who will bless his projects and stay out of his private affairs.
The second question is the practical outworking of the first: "Will he call on God at all times?" Because the righteous man delights in God, he cultivates constant communion with Him. Prayer is not just for emergencies; it is for all times. In prosperity, he calls on God with thanksgiving. In adversity, he calls on God with supplication. In confusion, he calls on God for wisdom. In the morning, at noon, and at night, his life is a continual conversation with his Father. It is the natural breathing of a soul that lives in fellowship with God.
The godless man does not do this. He calls on God only when the roof is caving in. His prayer life is not a constant communion but a series of sporadic panic buttons. The rest of the time, when the sun is shining and the bank account is full, God is utterly forgotten. This reveals the true state of his heart. He does not love God; he only wants to use God. And a God who is only useful in a crisis is not the God of the Bible. That is an idol, a rabbit's foot, a celestial insurance policy with fine print he never bothered to read.
Conclusion: A Hope That Holds
Job's words here are a bucket of ice water for any who are tempted to trifle with God. He is showing us that a life built apart from a genuine, delight-filled, constant relationship with the Almighty is a house built on sand. It may look impressive for a season, but the storm is coming, and the final inspection is certain. On that day, the hope of the godless will be exposed as a worthless, counterfeit currency.
What is the alternative? The alternative is the hope that Job himself, even in his darkest hour, clung to: "For I know that my Redeemer lives" (Job 19:25). The true hope is not an abstract principle or a positive mindset. The true hope has a name, and that name is Jesus Christ. He is the one who took the full curse of the wicked upon Himself at the cross, so that we who were unjust might be declared righteous.
The gospel is the great reversal. We who had no hope, who were godless in the world, have been brought near by the blood of Christ (Ephesians 2:12-13). Because of Jesus, we can now "take delight in the Almighty." Indeed, we can call Him Abba, Father. Because of Jesus, God does hear our cry when distress comes, not because we have been faithful at all times, but because our great High Priest ever lives to intercede for us.
Do not be the man Job describes. Do not build your life on the shifting sands of your own efforts or the flimsy foundation of a convenient religion. Examine your hope. Is it in your portfolio, or in your Redeemer? Do you delight in God Himself, or only in His gifts? Do you call on Him at all times, or only when your self-sufficiency fails? Flee the bankrupt hope of the godless and lay hold of the sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, which is Christ Himself. For when God requires your soul, only that hope will hold.